Smashing Pumpkins announce fall tour because fall is pumpkin-smashing season

Ever wonder why we even bother to report Smashing Pumpkins-related news? Well, basically it’s because we’d take a good punchline over a good story any day of the week. And there’s almost none better than Billy Corgan. Let’s face it, to the contributors and general readership of a site such as ours, the man’s exploits are a comedy of errors. But sometimes, I have to admit that talking about our friend The Corgmeister gets more straight-up infuriating than amusing. Especially at the beginning of a long work week. So if it’s okay with you, I thought I’d just take this opportunity to try out my George Carlin impression for this story? It probably still needs some fine-tuning, but tell me how I do (and if you’re a little kid, maybe don’t read it). Okay, so here we go. Picture me wearing black clothes with a ponytail or whatever:

Okay, first of all, fuck Billy Corgan for even making me have to type the words “teargarden” and “kaleidyscope”. Seriously, what the fuck is that shit? Come on, you know that you’re feeling me on this. Let’s look at you, reader. Yes YOU. The guy reading this right now. Why are you sitting here feeling all broke and stuck and dead-endy, reading this jagjob website instead of looking for a real jagjob so you can pay all your jagbills while this son of a bitch gets paid to flit around the US this fall for another sad little tour with his latest mangled incarnation of the Smashing Pumpkins project? Complete insanity.

Second of all, they’re touring with this ongoing Teargarden album thing. (You know, the one that only ekes out a little music every once in a while because it’s not really a functional band but has the audacity to claim that they’re doing it that way on purpose as some sort of concept?? That one.) And there’s even news of a potential “album-within-an-album” called Oceania coming out this September as part of the Kaleidyscope series. Album-within-an-album? Let me tell you, reader: the only thing kaleidoscopic about this whole pissfuck of a project is the horseshit they’re spraying everywhere!

But so anyway, here they come this fall, right? They’re trodding all this bullshit behind them, like a dog dragging his ass across your nice white Berber carpet — you know, on account of how good all this texture feels on his ass — from Los Angeles to Philadelphia, basically wiping their shit-stained asses with the whole damn country. Oh, I tell ya, it’s all just one big shit show, reader, and you and I are the toilet paper!

…So, what do you think? Yeah, you’re right. I probably need to work on it some more. Oh well. Thanks for indulging me; at least I feel a little better now. Check below for the tourdates, and I guess tell your friends and coworkers that DO actually like Smashing Pumpkins that tickets will be available beginning Friday, August 19.

I’m sure your parents gave you the talk at age 14 about how drugs make you lazy and unmotivated. Nathan Williams’ parents probably gave him the same speech, which didn’t stop one of today’s most publicized stoners from getting simultaneously high and popular under the name — you know it — Wavves. After recording two albums à la Crystal Castles (that is, obnoxiously self-titled), and the pompously-entitled King of the Beach (TMT Review), Wavves have announced a new EP, this time called Life Sux, to be released on Williams’ own label, Ghost Ramp.

Does life suck for Nathan Williams? He presumably still smokes a lot of weed, which I’m told mellows people out and is a way of allaying depression. He’s also still with Best Coast’s Bethany Cosentino (who sings on one track of the EP), and is a cat owner, which apparently can prolong your life and lower stress levels. Things just don’t add up in that department, but the EP is supposed to be less self-revelatory and more “the tale of two loathsome characters locked down in Bummertown.” I think it’s fair to assume that the two do not include Williams and co. Even Fucked Up’s Damian Abraham gets in on the action, and who wants to jump on a sinking ship?

In the interest of those who may be currently under the influence, I’ll repeat the relevant information in case you forgot. Wavves’ EP Life Sux is out September 20 on Ghost Ramp, marking the first release from Nathan Williams’ label. Got it? Now go raid the fridge. Or better yet, record a full-length album before the end of the year — because that’s what Wavves are doing.

During a recent interview with Spinner, Death Cab for Cutie were interrupted by Flaming Lips front man Wayne Coyne who, after announcing collaborations with Black Moth Super Rainbow and Nick Cave, quickly propositioned the Cuties about a joint EP between Death Cab and the Lips. Ben Gibbard quickly agreed and, while no release date (or any other pertinent information) is available yet, Flaming Death Cab will soon become a reality.

The EP, which I would title Yoshimi Battles the Plans, will most likely be three to four songs, just like recent Flaming Lips collaborations with Lightning Bolt, Neon Indian, and Prefuse 73. If you’re curious how the whole thing came together, then you should know a little secret of the music business: big-time music festivals (like Osheaga in Montreal, where Death Cab and the Flamers recently played and where the co-project took its first steps) aren’t really put together for the benefit of fans but rather as a place for musicians to mingle and form side-projects; in other words, while you’re tripping on MDMA and listening to music through the haze of foot-traffic and drunken quarrels, all of your favorite artists are forming secret bands. Now that’s a fact, jack.

Smart dude, synthpop musician, and international playboy John Maus is hoping we can all just put that Pitchfork interview I-hate-record-stores-because-once-one-looked-at-me-funny-and-also-I-hear-they-feast-on-the-blood-of-fuzzy-wuzzy-kittens (He doesn’t! They don’t!) thing behind him and just get excited for the fact that he’s striking out on tour this fall. (We can!) Critical acclaim is still rolling in for Maus’ breakthrough album on Ribbon, We Must Become the Pitiless Censors of Ourselves (TMT Review), which has been ruling the waves of college radio and rockin’ the collective socks of off the nü-goths in grimy basements across the nation all summer long.

And now, just in time for back-to-school, you can experience the wonder that is John! Maus! Live! at your very own art school and/or Moogfest. Well, if you attend Bard or Oberlin, that is. The rest of you North Americans will either have to drive to one of the major metropolitan areas known as “Chicago,” “Philadelphia” or “Eastern Canada.” And, at the end of October, Mr. Maus’ icy, autumnal melodies will usher in Samhain at Asheville, North Carolina’s always intriguing Moogfest. Maus will be on hand for any ritual sacrifices/casting of bones into a large bonfire that serves as a portal between worlds/late night druid shit between the dark days of October 28-30. Austra, Crystal Castles, James Murphy, Suicide, and sooooo many more will also grace the stages of beautiful Asheville during Moogfest Eve(s).

In the words of gifted seer and internet also-ran Rebecca Black (hey, five months ago is like an entire decade in World Wide Web time), “Yesterday was Thursday (Thursday)/Today i-is Friday (Friday)/We we we so excited/We so excited/Because a new Weeknd mixtape dropped yesterday.” For real guys, those are the words. You don’t remember it like that? Well I can’t tooootally blame you… five months is a long time to remember an internet meme. I mean, you barely even remember that YouTube video about the leprechaun in Mobile, Alabama now do you? Cough! PHILISTINE. Whoa, what was that? Nah, I didn’t say anything, there was something in my throat. Sorry.

Anyway, the Weeknd mixtape prophesied by that mellifluous Nostradamus of the new millennium did in fact materialize on the interwebs yesterday, and it’s called (drum roll, please)… Thursday. Yeah, everybody likes Thursday! The elusive Toronto mixmaster’s website was down for awhile yesterday, but everything seems to have returned to normal and the mix is once again available for download. So, dear designer-drug-loving-dance-crazed reader, go ahead! Suit up in your finest gold lamé, bring out the glass table, and get ready to shake it till ya break it, because just in time for the weekend, The Weeknd is back. And watch this space — a third Weeknd mixtape, Echoes of Silence, is rumored to be in the works for a fall release.

Thursday Tracklisting:

01. Lonely Star
02. Life of the Party
03. Thursday
04. The Zone
05. The Birds Part One
06. The Birds Part Two
07. Heaven or Las Vegas

The Director of A&R for VP Records, Joel Chin, 35, was fatally shot in the head in front of his Stony Hill, St Andrew home, a few miles north of Jamaica’s capital Kingston, at 10:45 PM last night (August 16) as he alighted from his car. Neighbors heard explosions and called the Stony Hill police. Chin was taken to Kingston Public Hospital where he was officially pronounced dead.

Joel Chin is the son of reggae producer Clive Chin, best known for his work with Black Uhuru and the late melodica player Augustus Pablo, and the grandson of Vincent and Patricia Chin, who founded VP Records in Kingston, Jamaica in 1959.

There is currently no known motive for his murder although an investigation is pending; the assailants remain at large.